JOURNAL OF BUSINESS DIVERSITY


Trouble at the Top: Women Who Don’t Want to Work for a Female Boss




Author(s): F. Robert Buchanan, Renee L. Warning, Robert P. Tett

Citation: F. Robert Buchanan, Renee L. Warning, Robert P. Tett, (2012) "Trouble at the Top: Women Who Don’t Want to Work for a Female Boss," Journal of Business Diversity, Vol.12, Iss. 1, pp. 33 - 46

Article Type: Research paper

Publisher: North American Business Press

Abstract:

An exploratory field study inquired whether women like to be supervised by a female manager. The more
jobs held by female respondents, the less they preferred having a woman for a boss. Additionally, there
was negative bias related to the age of the female manager. There were no similar effects between male
subordinates and managers of either gender. In fact, the more jobs males had in their careers, the more
they believed that females make the best boss. Implications are discussed toward whether the glass
ceiling for females is being perpetuated to some degree by other females in subordinate positions.